Perreault v. Smith

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Perreault was alone with his four-month-old daughter when he called 911 to report that Jenna had been injured. Police and paramedics arrived and found that Jenna had suffered a blunt-force trauma to the head. She died from her injuries. Perreault was indicted for first-degree felony murder and felony child abuse. He claimed that he had dropped Jenna, had fallen on top of her, and that she may have hit her head on an object as they fell. The state produced the testimony of the emergency room doctor that Jenna’s injuries could have been caused only by a narrow range of high-impact events, such as a high-speed car accident, a fall from several stories, or “a baseball bat to the head.” Convicted, Perreault was sentenced to life in prison. The Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed. He filed an unsuccessful state post-conviction petition, arguing ineffective assistance. The Sixth Circuit affirmed a denial of federal habeas relief. The state court did not unreasonably apply clearly established Supreme Court precedent in rejecting claims that Perreault’s statement during his interrogation, “let’s call the lawyer then ‘cause I gave what I could,” constituted an unambiguous invocation of the right to counsel that required the police to stop questioning him and that Perreault’s trial counsel was ineffective because he failed to challenge the state expert’s testimony about the cause of Jenna’s injuries. View "Perreault v. Smith" on Justia Law